More in Mergers & Acquisitions

Border States Electric (BSE), Fargo, N.D., has reached an agreement to purchase Western Extralite, Kansas City, Mo., which more than 250 employees and 19 locations in Kansas and Missouri. Western Extralite will join Border States on Oct. 1....More

3M New Ventures – the corporate venture arm of 3M – announced an equity stake in Toronto-based Smart Energy Instruments (SEI), a move that will further accelerate SEI’s efforts in developing electronic chipsets with high-precision, real-time monitoring capabilities for smart grids, as well as give 3M a bigger presence in the energy sector....More

VEC Supply, Charlottesville, Va., a distributor of datacom, security and industrial automation products, has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the assets of American Electronic Supply Co., a distributor of datacom, security, audio-visual and cable television products based in Birmingham, Ala....More

Regal Beloit Corp., Beloit, Wis., has acquired Benshaw Inc., a manufacturer of custom low- and medium-voltage drives and soft starters, from Curtiss-Wright Corp. for a purchase price of was approximately $50 million....More

Trinity Industries Inc., Dallas, announced on June 27 that it has entered into an agreement to acquire the assets of Meyer Steel Structures the utility steel structures division of Thomas & Betts Corp./ABB Group, Memphis, Tenn., for a purchase price of approximately $600 million....More

IESA (Costa Rica) and Melexa (Colombia) have joined Sonepar, according to information posted on the company’s website. As a result of these two acquisitions Sonepar now operates in a total of 40 different countries....More

VEC, LLC, a leading distributor of datacom, security and industrial automation products, today announced they have signed a definitive agreement to acquire the assets of Connect-It, a datacom products and custom cable provider based in Raleigh, N.C....More

HT Capital Advisors is an investment banking firms with a major focus on the electrical wholesaling industry, and over the years it has represented the owners of many electrical distributors in mergers and acquisitions. As an executive on the HT Capital Advisors team who has worked on many of these acquisitions, we thought Burke Burkhardt could give us a good idea of what’s happening with mergers and acquisitions in the electrical market. He offered his insight in the following Q&A....More

Border States Electric branches in Tennessee have operated until recently under the trade names Harris Electric Supply and UtiliCor. April 1, all Harris Electric Supply and UtiliCor branches changed their name to Border States Electric. Additionally, the Nashville UtiliCor branch relocated to the Harris Electric Supply (Wedgewood) facility in February....More

WESCO has made some major acquisitions of industrial, MRO and safety distributors over the past few years, and it continued to build its business north of the border with the acquisition of Hazmasters Inc., a Toronto-based safety products distributor....More

EIS Inc., Atlanta, has acquired the assets of Electro-Wire, Inc., Schaumburg, Ill. Electro-Wire is a distributor and contract manufacturer of specialty wire and cable products with four locations in the United States primarily serving the telecom and transit markets....More

Actuant Corp., Milwaukee, Wis., completed the sale of its electrical business lines to private equity firm Sentinel Capital Partners, New York, for $258 million in cash. The business includes brands such as Gardner Bender tools, Marinco and Mastervolt marine electrical equipment, Acme transformers and Turner Electric high-voltage switches....More

Global electrical and process automation giant Emerson Electric Co., St. Louis, has agreed to acquire SPX Corp.’s 44.5% minority interest in EGS Electric Group LLC, giving Emerson full ownership of the business. It will now be called the Appleton Group....More

Tool and equipment manufacturer Greenlee, Rockford, Ill., is continuing to beef up its offerings for the power utility market. Last month it announced the acquisition of HD Electric Co. (HDE), Waukegan, Ill., a designer and manufacturer of utility-grade testing, measuring and control equipment....More

Webinars

The North American electrical wholesaling industry is being rocked by mergers & acquisitions, advances in technology, new competition from offshore and an uncertain economy. In this 60-minute webinar, Electrical Wholesaling Chief Editor Jim Lucy will discuss the changes in the electrical market now having the most impact on electrical distributors, electrical manufacturers and independent manufacturers’ reps....More